


things that grow and are not barren

by flustereddarcy



Category: Gallagher Girls Series - Ally Carter
Genre: F/M, matt morgan was too good for this world, rachel and joe are a perfect pair in their later lives honestly, rachel is really good at gardening idk, the ultimate friends to lovers scenario, this is what happens when a headcanon becomes too real in my head
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-06
Updated: 2019-02-06
Packaged: 2019-10-23 11:03:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,642
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17682221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flustereddarcy/pseuds/flustereddarcy
Summary: “I want to be a healer, and love all things that grow and are not barren.” -Eowyn,The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.Rachel and Joe in the aftermath and everything after, as slowly and naturally as a growing garden.





	things that grow and are not barren

**1.**

Rachel loves flowers, and Joe loves that Rachel loves flowers.

It’s always been a trait of hers, ever since they were young and silly and were convinced that they weren’t nearly as fragile as the peonies and petunias she cultivated. The apartment back in DC–-decades ago now, he feels old just thinking of it-–that Rachel shared with her roommate at the time was practically a greenhouse, tidy and clean and small except for the plants and petals and pots _everywhere._

The air in the living room is clean and fresh and beautifully sunlit and smells like every flower he’s ever smelled. “I…wouldn’t have bet you were the flower type, Rachel,” he’d said, leaning on the kitchen counter while she rummaged for whatever it was she needed last-minute before they went to meet Matt on the Mall. She lightly pushes a pot out of the way of her roaming hands, past a framed photo of herself and Matt looking adorable in New York City.

She’d grinned at him, looking for all the world like a rose herself. She glanced at the veritable jungle around them with blooms so gorgeous they look like she might’ve sang them into growing. “I don't have too many weak spots, Joe.”

~ ~ ~

**2.**

Somehow, in the middle of January in snowy Virginia, Cameron Ann Morgan is welcomed into the world with flowers. He couldn’t be there when she was born--a mission in Delhi had gone a bit south-–and so, to overcompensate, Joe had gone out of his way to buy a ridiculous (albeit manageable) amount of pink and yellow roses and send them to the Morgan household in Arlington. He’d gotten a call from Matthew within minutes of their arrival home from the hospital.

“Joseph,” he says, laughing with a joy that practically radiates across the world to him on the other line.

"Yes, Matthew?”

“This is a lot of flowers.”

“Only the best for the radiant mother and your recent arrival. Congrats, buddy.”

He doesn’t need to be there to know that his best friend is smiling like sunshine. "Man…you should see Rachel’s face.”

~ ~ ~

**3.**

It’s years later when they discuss flowers again, with the exception of their occasional joking quip at her seeming preference for the company of succulents or tulips over actual people. It’s not long after the funeral, and it’s not long before her trip to Arlington so she can get shipped off to some shitstorm overseas and let out her grief on people who she won’t be frowned on for murdering.

The house is quiet–-Matt’s not gallivanting about the rooms for painfully obvious reasons, and Cammie is staying with her grandparents. There’s a suitcase on the floor and a backpack in a chair and the kitchen table is covered in bouquets and pots of flowers, and Rachel looks like she wants to suffocate herself in them.

“Most of these don’t even mean anything related to grief,” she said, and her voice is such a dead monotone that it makes his insides recoil like nails on a chalkboard.

Joe hesitates, and he knows that she noticed, but when she would’ve looked back at him questioningly a month ago, she just keeps staring at nothing now. “What do they mean?” he asked.

She doesn’t move from her position of leaning against the kitchen counter. “Pink carnations are for gratitude, white roses for purity, daffodils for chivalry, pansies for loving thoughts…” Her voice trails off. “The peonies are accurate, though. The pale pink ones that look a bit like roses.”

He waits for her to finish.

“Healing.”

He knows it’s stupid to ask, but she’s opened the figurative door and he’s just standing there in the figurative doorway and the air smells like decaying petals and unwashed dishes and he _hates_ that dead, tired look on her face, so–- “And what do you think?"

Finally she looks at him. Her eyes are red. "Of healing?”

He nods.

There’s a pause that caves in his chest, and then, “We’ll see.” She sighs. “ I need to get going.”

“Yeah."

~ ~ ~

**4.**

Her office at the Gallagher Academy is surprisingly conservative in terms of plant count, considering the fact that he knows flowers make her feel at home. But when he walked into her expansive office, warm and definitely hers but still somehow different, he realized that maybe home wasn’t what she wanted.

The white calla lilies in the blue vase on her desk were impossible to miss-–they were a gift from Cammie for Mother’s Day, and they filled the room with a smooth, pleasant smell. The bookshelves had succulents on them here and there in small, colorful vases, and a pot of violets sat on the windowsill, basking in the summer sunlight.

"Great, you’re early. I hoped you’d be. I’d like to get this done as soon as humanly possible,” she’d said, looking up at him with a quick, casual smile.

“You and me both. There’s a six-pack at the safehouse with my name on it,” he’d replied before sitting down, and the comment got a chuckle out of her.

“Excuse me while I try to imagine Joseph Solomon watching football with a beer in one hand and the remote in the other,” she joked. Rarely since he’d started teaching at the Academy had he seen Rachel so casual; she wore a simple blouse and worn-in jeans and her hair was somehow perfect even though he knew she’d probably only brushed it that morning. Good thing she’s gotten up to filter through her cabinet, or else she’d notice the fact that he was–-

“You’re staring.”

Of course he couldn’t get away with it–-they’re both spies. “I apologize. I was deep in thought.”

“About?” The question is about as casual as her tone, but the quick, darting motion in her eyes as she stands up and turns around to him again makes his stomach drop for a second. If he wanted to, he could just bite the bullet, here and now, but…

“The flowers on your desk. They look nice,” he said, and they both knew that he wasn’t referring to the regal lilies in the glass vase.

For a split, tiny second, Rachel almost looked disappointed. Her face shifted ever so slightly and ever so quickly, like she was trying to suppress a reaction, but she covered it with a radiant, honest smile. “Thank you. They’re from Cam, though I assume you knew that.”

“She mentioned it.” He nodded to them, looking from the flowers to her as she sat back down behind her desk. “They’re gorgeous.”

“You think so?”

“I know so.“

And then her cheeks turn the slightest bit pink, and Joe thinks that maybe he might love flowers, too.

~ ~ ~

**5.**

Their wedding is a cavalcade of food and lights and laughter and dancing and so many _flowers_ , and she likes the tulips the most.

~ ~ ~

**6.**

The cabin comes to life with her in it. It’s been his place for so long, part safe house, part home, part haunted shack with walls that creak with sadness, but once he and Rachel start spending more time there, it gradually-–no, who is he kidding, it _immediately_ starts to change, and he loves it.

The first things that happen are her clothes, folded neatly in drawers and hung up primly in the wardrobe, a dark purple raincoat on the hook by the door and her favorite shirt tossed on the bed because there was too much fabric between her skin and his hands. Then it’s food, things that she always eats but he doesn't as much as he should; a bowl full of fruit appears on the table, and vegetables from the garden begin to inhabit the fridge.

And next inevitably come the flowers and plants. It happened slowly: a pot in the windowsill, a small vase on the coffee table, a set of tangling leaves hanging from the cabinets in the kitchen. And before he knows it she has the aforementioned vegetable garden outside where tomatoes and squash and cucumbers grow and she doesn’t even use gloves, her perfect nails underscored with the soil that’s crept into the crevices in her palms.

It’s fitting, he thinks, that she loves plants. For all the necessary harshness he’s ever seen in her, all the grief or anger or frustration, Rachel is such a loving person. She’s such a nurturer and such a mother, and so of course the hands that hold his tightly or push Cam’s hair away from her face or adjust Zach’s collar and pick dirt off it are perfectly at home arranging leaves and petals on the porch of their little cabin in the woods.

~ ~ ~

**7.**

She leaves a sprig of white carnations on his gravestone in Nebraska, and they kiss and they squeeze each other’s hands and try not to get too choked up, and that is the end of that.

~ ~ ~

**8.**

"Happy anniversary.” He slides the vase of red, red roses onto the table, and she has the grace to look surprised.

“Oh, Joe, you didn’t have to,” she says, putting down the newspaper and looking up at him like all spouses do when their partner gives them a surprise gift.

He kisses her on the cheek. “No, I didn’t. But it’s our tenth anniversary and I wanted to.” He starts to rub her shoulders–-how is she still so tense all the time?-–and she sighs into it. “What do you want to do today?”

“I don't know yet.” She reaches out to touch the petals, shifting the velvety texture between her fingers. “How did you know?”

“Know what?”

“That roses are one of my favorites.”

He chuckled. “I know you love flowers,” he replied.

She looked up at him, catching his eyes and holding him there. “Do you?”

“I’ve got a pretty good idea.”


End file.
